


Howl I ever live without you? (I’m mutts about you!)

by Izupie



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: (or sort of he's actually a Hellhound), Alternate Universe - Magic, Eddie Kaspbrak is a Little Shit, Eddie accidentally summons a Richie, Lucky Him?, M/M, Richie Tozier Flirts, Summoning, Werewolf Richie Tozier, Witch Eddie Kaspbrak
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:41:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26451271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Izupie/pseuds/Izupie
Summary: "Don't you think they're going to notice that you're never around when my familiar is? And that you're weirdly into bad dog puns?""Baddog puns? Sorry, Eds, you'll have tofur-giveme if I disagree.""How do I un-summon you right now."-----Eddie's last year at the magical institute he calls both school and home is underway, but he remains the only student in his year who hasn't successfully summoned a familiar. It's probably fine that he's practising restricted magic completely unsupervised. Probably. Summoning a magical creature from a different dimension sounds like a spell where absolutely nothing could possibly go wrong... What the fuck is aHellhound?
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak & Richie Tozier, Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 11
Kudos: 85





	Howl I ever live without you? (I’m mutts about you!)

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be me just writing a little drabble about a Witch!Eddie accidentally summoning a Hellhound!Richie to fill the half an hour I had before bed, but then I got into the idea and this happened. It's not set in like, Hogwarts or anything, but I imagine it's a bit like a cross between that and like a regular boarding school. Idk I wish I had time to expand on this, but I have so many other projects to do aaa.
> 
> This is staying as a oneshot for now, but I may return in future. I just don't want to lose it to the tumblr void.

The magic circle on the floor pulsed a dull purple, barely light enough to add even a slight glow to the room. Eddie squinted at the book open on his desk, pushing his face close enough that he could smell the musty pages. He shot back up and rubbed his nose, even though it hadn’t touched the book anyway. Fucking library spell books – Creation only knew how many students had touched these pages in the past. He shuddered and rubbed his nose harder.

“What the fuck is with spells requiring candlelight anyway – how’s anyone supposed to see anything?” Eddie shoved up the sleeves of his black robes and moved a candle closer to the book. The last thing he needed was for his robes to catch fire. He’d seen the results of that when the new kid had got overenthusiastic lighting the fire under his cauldron during Potion Making. Not that it had been much a problem for him, since even though he'd transferred into their class late into the year he’d already summoned himself a familiar. A fire-aligned Hellcat. The flames on his sleeves had disappeared in a blink.

Eddie grabbed a glass beaker from beside the spell book, half full of salt, and shook it vigorously - straight into the faintly glowing magic circle on his wooden floor. _Four shakes exactly._ The salt crystals popped as they touched the chalk marks. He really didn't want to think about how long it had taken him to steal enough tiny pieces of Dragon Chalk to merge them into a piece big enough to draw the summoning circle with. Then he'd struggled to drag both his desk and his bed out of the way to give himself enough space to even draw it, so now it was cramped and crowded around the edges of his tiny room, where he was having to stand wedged between the edge of the desk and his door to make sure nothing was touching the chalk marks. He'd made sure the door was locked before he started, but even just thinking about it made him itch to run over and check the handle again. Eddie couldn't resist a glance over, but there was no indication that he had locked it just from its appearance of course, and he could barely see it properly in the candlelight anyway. He’d only managed to steal a few almost-entirely-burned-down candles from his classes without anyone noticing too, so he had a very limited amount of light, and one of them had already sputtered out in the time it had taken him to prepare the ingredients for the spell.

"Fucking candlelight," Eddie grumbled. "I bet there's a statistic for how many accidents performing magic in such shitty light there are." Eddie flicked a tiny black feather into the circle and it disappeared with a sizzle.

"And everything's made out of wood! Knock a candle over and everything's lighting up. Or your robes could catch fire, like the new kid's did. Or- or- you could add the wrong ingredient to your spell because you can't read the fucking spell book right in front of your nose." He gestured with his hands while he ranted, checking the book again with narrowed eyes. 

Spells often had a lot of steps (too many steps) - complex magic circles drawn only in Dragon Chalk, dumb looking ceremonial actions, ridiculous sounding words of power, too many highly specific ingredients to add to the circle - but he'd always hated this spell in particular. Maybe it wasn't the spell itself, but it was that the whole thing reminded him of failure? Eddie flung a pinch of the herbs he had crushed earlier (ground in an anti-clockwise motion for three minutes) into the circle, and it pulsed again as the powder disappeared into the spell. He should probably concentrate.

Eddie gave a small sigh as he re-read the words he would need to say next, even though he'd said them in class enough times to have them memorised by now. Reciting incantations had always made him feel like even more of a loser, so he usually rushed the words out too quickly in an effort to get it over with. “I summon thee,” he hissed, feeling ridiculous even though he was alone, and desperately hoping he wasn’t going to wake any of his neighbours. “I summon a creature to be my balance. I summon a creature to be a conduit of my power.”

There was a beat of pure and utter silence, where Eddie felt heat creep up his neck, wondering how he would look stood at the side of a (probably not bright enough - does it look bright enough?) summoning circle, robes on in the middle of the night, squashed between his own furniture, arms raised in the air, reciting dumb sounding words of power.

He groaned and let his arms fall back to his sides. As much as he hated this, he was the one that had been gathering the ingredients together to perform the spell in his own room for half a semester, so he couldn't regret it. He wasn’t going to be the only one in his class without a familiar anymore. It was his last chance before he graduated.

Eddie couldn’t wait to see their faces when he walked out of the dorms in the morning, with a Hellcat familiar trotting beside him. He didn’t even care which element it was aligned to. He was convinced that the only reason he hadn't been able to summon one during their classes was because he struggled to perform when everyone was watching him. That was all. But... he could still hear his mother’s voice in his head whenever he failed a spell, telling him that he’s too weak to perform magic. She had cried and begged him not to go to the school when his magic manifested, telling him that his weak constitution would kill him if he became a witch – just like his father. Well, too bad for her, that’s what had convinced him to go. Whatever happened to his dad... it wouldn't happen to him.

Eddie let three rose petals drift out of his fingers into the circle.

He was stronger than that. He was more _prepared_ than that. 

(He hoped.)

The petals disappeared and the circle finally began to glow a little brighter. Not exactly what the book was saying it should look like, but there was one more ingredient to go and Eddie was sure it would all come together after that. He felt a bubble of excitement in his stomach, but he tried to keep a straight face while he prepared to throw in the final sprig of holly – magic was serious business and he’d always been told the importance of treating it with reverence and respect when it was being performed. Eddie let out a little huff as he realised that _taking it seriously_ was probably why Stan was top of every class.

(He'd summoned a familiar in his very first try, the little shit.)

He shook his head and pushed away thoughts of Stan as he tried to focus again.

One ingredient left.

Then he would have a special familiar of his own, finally.

Eddie held the sprig of holly straight ahead of himself and drew a circle in the air counter-clockwise for a fraction with his left hand, before remembering it should be a clockwise circle in his _right hand_. In his flustered haste to swap the spiky leaves over he jabbed one of the points into his thumb and yelped as it pricked his finger sharply. Eddie shook his hand instantly out of pure reflex. Then watched in horror as the holly flew out of his fingers. And landed straight into the centre of the circle.

He stood frozen, anticipating an explosion, or a burst of flames or- or- _something._

But nothing happened.

Eddie could feel his heart pounding in his chest as he stared with wide eyes at his stupid mistake. Never Add Blood was like, _Rule Number One_ of performing spells!

But still nothing happened.

Eddie desperately wanted to pluck it back, and his fingers twitched restlessly at his side in response to the impulse, but crossing into a magic circle would be even worse than _adding blood into a summoning spell._ He was only just about mentally prepared for one absolute fuck up tonight.

Eddie barely breathed as he continued to stand frozen to the spot, but as the minutes ticked by he found the tension in his body loosening. The sprig of holly, with one tiny bead of red shining on its spikes, sat innocently in a circle that was growing dimmer by the second.

Oh. Well. At least nothing happening was worse than something terrible. He supposed.

But Eddie couldn’t help but feel a huge wave of disappointment that he’d gone to all the trouble of foraging for all the spell ingredients himself, stealing candles, stealing _Dragon Chalk,_ sweet talking Mike into letting him borrow out of the restricted section of the library and moving all his heavy furniture (what was with witches and stupidly heavy old fashioned wood) all the while trying not to wake anyone or arouse suspicion.

For nothing.

Eddie squeezed his tiny cut carefully, his attention drawing away from his failed spell, and watched as a bead of red welled up. He cringed, even at his own blood, and reached for a band aid from the fanny pack beneath his robes, yanking the zip open with more force than was necessary. He had hand washed all of the ingredients before the spell, just in case any residual dirt on the plant matter got into the circle, so he at least knew the cut was clean and was unlikely to get infected if he kept it covered. How To Avoid Infections was a thought that came much more naturally than Summon A Magical Familiar.

Eddie wrapped the band aid securely around his thumb and was smoothing it down with satisfaction when something flashing red caught his attention.

He looked up at the summoning circle with confusion, but horror crawled down his spine as he realised that the holly had finally disappeared. The circle was empty. And glowing a bright, blood red. It flashed again with a pulse that lit the entire room and Eddie jumped back with such force that he hit his hip against the desk that he was still wedged by.

“Shit!” he hissed. “Shit, shit, shit!”

The circle was so bright Eddie could no longer keep his eyes open, so he scrunched them closed tightly and held his hands up to shield them, his heart thudding wildly in his chest. _Shitshitshitshit._

When the light finally faded Eddie lowered his hands slowly, and he opened his eyes even slower, barely daring to look.

Through narrowed eyes Eddie realised that the summoning circle he’d drawn in chalk was gone, but in its place was a large black dog with shaggy, messy fur. Its bright, dark eyes regarded the room curiously, and a pink tongue lolled out of its mouth as it looked around. It was much larger than a regular dog – more like the size of a wolf, with long lanky legs and a thick bushy tail. Eddie took one sharp breath with the shock he couldn't conceal, and its eyes immediately flicked over to him. He slapped both of his hands over his mouth as its tall, pointed ears both perked higher on its head - now fully focused on him. He held its gaze and wondered if he should be following the advice that you should never look an animal in the eyes, or whether the advice was that you could look an animal in the eyes and make it think you were the boss. He never paid much attention in classes about Magical Creatures, but now he wished he had. The dog's tongue stayed flopped out of the side of bright canine teeth, as its mouth seemed to open even wider in something like a smile, almost offsetting how terrifyingly large and dangerous the creature looked.

Eddie tried to take another breath, but it came in wheezy and tight. _Oh, no._ He gripped a hand to his chest as he tried again, twisting the fabric of his robes in his fist, but he gulped on nothing and couldn’t even back any further away.

The dog’s tongue retreated into its mouth as it tilted its head curiously.

Eddie fumbled with the zip on his fanny pack, having closed it again after putting on his band aid, and distantly wondered if he’d prefer death by asthma (panic) attack or death by the teeth of whatever demon he had accidentally summoned. (Because really, what else could it be at this point.)

The dog barked – just a small yipping sound – and Eddie waved his hands rapidly in a shushing motion. “No, no, no! You’ll wake the dorm asshole!” he wheezed, then immediately paled because he’d just told some probable demon to shush _and then_ called it an asshole, when waking his classmates should be _really fucking low_ on the priority scale.

The dog huffed through its nose, in the way that dogs do, but there was almost an amused ring to it. Its tail thumped on the floor as it wagged a little.

Eddie reached again for his fanny pack, trying desperately to keep his breathing even but feeling his chest constrict even tighter with the effort. “Fuck,” he muttered as his panicked fingers struggled with the zip.

The dog huffed again, and a flash of red light sparkled in front of its paws.

Eddie froze. _What the..._ Sat innocently at the dog's paws was his inhaler. He’d know it anywhere. With a deep, shaky breath Eddie finally freed the zip from where it was caught and reached inside his fanny pack – no inhaler.

“How did you…?”

The dog’s tail thumped on the floor again. Did it expect him to reach over for it? Eddie squeezed his eyes shut. Well, he either picked up his inhaler or suffocated. But that thing’s teeth looked huge and sharp and it could just be waiting for an excuse for him to get close so it can snap its jaws around his neck...

The light from the few candles left burning was getting low, but Eddie looked over at the dog again. For some reason he just didn’t get the impression that it was unfriendly or that it wanted to hurt him. He supposed that if it had wanted to kill him it had had plenty of opportunities so far. Hadn’t it even somehow teleported his inhaler out of his fanny pack for him? Could be part of the trap though, Eddie thought again, as his mind raced in circles.

He let out another wheeze. “Fuck it. Don’t bite me.” He crouched down, reached forwards and in one jerky movement Eddie had straightened back up and breathed in a huge puff of his inhaler. He made a face at the taste.

Which started the tail wagging again. The dog was definitely amused.

“What are you?” came tumbling out of Eddie’s mouth before he could stop himself. The dog lifted its head to bark again and Eddie quickly placed his hand on top of it. The fur there was surprisingly soft and velvety. “No, shh, don’t bark.”

The dog let Eddie hold his hand there for a moment, blinking up at his with wide shining dark eyes and then Eddie yanked his hand away. The dog sneezed. There was another flash of red light, which Eddie had to shield his eyes from, and when he turned back there was now a person where the dog had been. The candlelight was even worse, but it was easy to see that he was taller than Eddie, with long limbs like the dog, almost lanky and out of proportion, messy black hair that looked just like its fur, and the same amused, dark eyes.

He was also naked.

Eddie immediately turned his face to the ceiling. “Oh for the love of Creation, put some fucking clothes on.”

A chuckle answered him and there was another flash of red.

“Better?”

When Eddie looked back, the stranger was wearing ripped black jeans and a black t-shirt, with a bright yellow button-down shirt open over the top. It had tiny black dogs printed all over it. And surprisingly a large pair of glasses stood out on his pale face.

For some reason it was the glasses that made Eddie lower his guard. Did demons need a prescription?

As if sensing that’s where Eddie’s attention lay the stranger pushed the glasses higher up his nose and tousled his hair, almost self-consciously. “Shitty eyesight,” he said with a shrug. “Which reminds me…” He clicked his fingers and the candlelight strengthened even though the candles stayed the same. The room was cast into a comfortable amount of light and Eddie realised that the demon looked almost the same age as himself.

"Pretty handy, right?" the stranger added.

Eddie felt his brows furrow strongly together. It was funny how a bit of light and the stranger's annoying swagger made him more confident. Whatever was going on, he wanted absolutely no part in it anymore. “Demon… be gone,” he said grandly, though still quietly, slashing his hands through the air as if that would help somehow.

“Uh… What are you doing?” The demon tilted his head in the same way he had done as the dog.

“Trying to un-summon you. Send you back to wherever you came from,” Eddie explained, turning back to the book on his desk and hoping there was an undo spell for blood related summoning mishaps.

_Fuck._

The demon laughed. “Wait, did you like, butt-dial me?”

“Butt-? What-?”

“You didn’t mean to summon me?” he clarified.

“What the fuck? No! Why would I want to summon a demon? I was supposed to summon a familiar. A Hellcat.”

He laughed again. “I’m not a demon, man!”

Eddie looked him up and down, his eyes even narrower than before. Scrutinising. Trying to find the truth. “Uh-huh,” he finally replied, unconvinced.

“Hey, I’m not. I’m a Hellhound.”

“Never heard of them.”

“Uh, yeah, because we’re super rare and cool.”

“Sure, okay. Well I was actually after a Hell _cat_ , so…” Eddie wasn’t sure what had possessed him to be this rude to the creature he had summoned, but there was something about the easy way he was looking at him, his relaxed posture and the amusement dancing in his dark eyes that just rubbed him the wrong way. His smile was a grin, all teeth, like when he’d been a dog – _hellhound –_ before. He would bet that if his tongue were long enough that he would let it loll out of his mouth like a dog too.

“If you could just go back to where you came from, that would be great, thanks.” Nobody would need to ever know that he had botched the spell this badly. What the fuck was a Hellhound anyway?

“That’s gonna be a problem, actually. I should probably introduce myself” – he cleared his throat – “the name’s Richie Tozier, Hellhound, and the new familiar of one Edward Kaspbrak.”

Eddie opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. Then finally settled with a quiet, “What?”

“Congratulations,” Richie said with a wink. “You got yourself a catch. Can I call you Eds?”

“No. Get out of my room.”

“-I’ll call you Eds. You sealed the summon with a blood pact. So, I’m here to stay – lucky you!”

“A blood pact?” Eddie managed, in a high panicked voice.

“Yup,” he replied with a pop on the ‘p’. “I require long walks and fresh human flesh twice a day.”

Eddie paled.

“Oh fuck, Eds, I’m kidding, I’m kidding!” He waved his hands in the air in surrender. “I’m your familiar, so as long as you don’t use up all your magic, I’m good.”

Eddie let the words ‘your familiar’ sink in for a moment before he finally let out a breath. “Don’t call me Eds.”

Richie laughed, which didn’t bode well for him taking any notice. Weren’t familiars supposed to do what their witch said? But then again, he’d never heard of a familiar that could shapeshift. He’d never even heard of a Hellhound at all until five minutes ago. He was in way over his head. What kind of accidental magic did he just do?

Eddie sighed and raked his hands through his hair. “I have no idea how I’m going to explain you to the teachers tomorrow. Like, what do I do? Confess to performing restricted magic unsupervised?”

“What a coincidence! Restricted-Magic-Unsupervised are my middle names. Just one long hyphenated word.”

Eddie felt his nose scrunch. “That's not true.” And he wanted to kick himself because why did he sound _unsure?_ Of course those weren't his middle names. 

Richie's face lit up at his hesitant tone. “Well, you’re stuck with me now,” he said with another wink, “so you'll be able to learn what my middle name really is one day. I already know yours must be cutie, right?"

"How the hell do I un-summon you?" Eddie groaned. 

**Author's Note:**

> Join me on my tumblr [Izupie](https://izupie.tumblr.com/) ~


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